Wednesday January 27

Math

Nathan completed chapter 20 today.  This morning he was very slow at working at his math, he asked me to help him, and I knew it was a question he should be able to do on his own.  He could not sit still and was rolling on the ground.  I asked about a headache, and then finally found out his shoulder was hurting him.  I asked if it required a tylenol and he wanted one.  I could see in about 20 minutes he was starting to improve, just in time to get ready for physio and hockey.  I had talked to Nathan and we have been working the last few weeks on the fact we need to complete all the work we have scheduled for the day.  I told him if he did not get his math and socials work completed before physio, he would have to do it after hockey.  This may sound slightly unkind as he really was not feeling well.  But I would like him to get used to the fact that even if he is sick, he will have to make up work on his own time, and this may mean on the weekend.  I think this will prepare him for highschool and also for working and having deadlines etc.

Genevieve completed lessons 32 and 33 in rightstart.  Here are some pictures of some worksheets she has been doing the last week or so.  Of course Rightstart is more then worksheets, and we have had lots of oral questions, discussions, and games.

So both Genevieve and Nathan are 1 day behind in the lesson plan I had written for the rest of the year.  We will have to make up a lesson one of these days.

Lesson 29 Fractions in circles

Objectives: to find fractions in circles
to review definitions of Geometric figures
to draw common fractions with the drawing tools

worksheet 26

Lesson 30 percent in circles

Objective: to find percenteges in circles

to review equilateral, isosceles, and scalene triangles

to learn to measure angles with a goniometer (this was the best part for gigi)

worksheet 27

Lesson 31 Pie Charts

Objectives : To find percentages of circles

to review right, acute, and obtuse angles

to draw pie charts

worksheet 28

lesson 32 On to the Millions

Objectives : To understand numbers to the millions
to practice writing and reading numbers

worksheet 29

Lesson 33 Reviewing multiplication

Objectives : to understand how multiplication relates to addition
to discover and practice multiplication algorithm

worksheet 30

Socials Canada's Timeline

Both Genevieve and Nathan had to work on their socials after they arrived home today, so Genevieve that was after dinner from 6:30-7.  Nathan was from 4:30-5:15.  They were not very efficient in their schoolwork this morning.

Genevieves timeline

Nathan's timeline

Physio therapy

went well

Music therapy

Nathan worked on some scales today in music therapy, he enjoyed doing this, and his hands were very tired after.  Nathan and I discussed that this would be good for him to do everyday, and that he will start tomorow morning 15 minutes before 9 am when school starts.

Genevieve wrote a song today, I wish I had a recording of it, I think it was her best song yet.

CSOPA

Genevieve received her script today!  Yeah, she can now start working on it.

Nathan lost 4 teeth last night and this is a picture from 2 days ago when he lost 1 so 5 teeth in 2 days!!!  he is now  called toothless

Another Tuesday.

Nathan slept in today until 9:45, I tried to wake him at 8:45, he did not wake up.  I decided to let him sleep as I figured he needed it.  Last time he slep in he had a massive migraine so I was concerned.  He was a little off today, with lots of highs.  We tried to control those.  

While nathan was sleeping, Genevieve and I decided to have a power struggle, uggg.  Genevieve did not want to practice her music, what this tells me is she is up against a challenge.  I think she is finding her songs difficult.  Because I was not the best parent this morning, I entered the power struggle, and she now has lost electronic privileges, yeah I won! Or did I?   Of course if I was in my great parenting day, I would have figured out what was causing her issues and we could have helped her over this.  So Genevieve worked a little colouring her pictures for her Newspaper report.  

Canada Studies

While eating breakfast I read to the kids about John Cabot.  We read from a few different recourses.  

We then went to work on our timelines.  We found a map of canada with different regions for natives of canada.  We then cut out pictures from canada natives long ago with food, shelter and transportation for the different areas.  Nathan took this project on, he was looking up on his computer, and researching, he was then writing a little bit beside the pictures explaining.  

We still have more to do on this page, my phone was acting up so know pictures, but maybe I will remember when I get back home.  

So even though this timeline takes a lot of time to do I think it is an excellent project and filled with lots of information and it really helps nathan and Genevieve to retain the information.  We will continue even though it is time consuming.  We are reading about 2 days ahead of our timeline. 

Piano

Nathan went first, nathan has discussed many times that he would not like to continue piano for next year.  We will need to rethink this in the spring

Genevieve enjoyed her lessons and I think felt a bit better about her songs.  

Math

Genevieve completed lesson 29 & 30

Nathan had not finished his bridge test yesterday, so he finished today.  I discussed he will need to complete a extra lesson at some point. 

After piano Nate and Gigi had 1 hour of free time.  Genevieve decided running up and down the hill a few times was a good idea, she then played in the backyard for a bit.  Nathan went and played with his RC. 

Cheer

2 1/2 hours of cheer for Genevieve

Day 2 of stop motion

Nathan has been waking up in the mornings at about 7 am everyday.  When he wakes up he is taking laundry downstairs and starting a load of laundry.  He is also emptying the dishwasher every morning, letting Ginger out and what ever other chores he can think of to do.  He has become quite the little helper around the house the last few months.  I could not be happier, as it truly does help me out so much.  Before he goes to bed every night he sorts our clean laundry and puts it away.

Genevieve will do chores but she has to be asked to do them, so I can say can you help me with dinner, or can you set the table please, and without question she will help me out.  She is sleeping in, in the mornings though since getting sick.  She still has dark circles under her eyes from lack of sleep, and I dont think she is sleeping well, as she has crawled into my bed a few times the last few weeks.  I hope she starts to feel better soon.  I have been letting her sleep until about 8-9 am, and she has been going to sleep fairly early for her.

Jessica's art class

Nathan and Genevieve are enjoying producing stop motion.  They worked more today on a few characters, and their set design.  They played around and figured out how they were going to work it. They did a few frames today, but will do the entire filming next time.  I will have to figure out how to download a stopmotion app on Nathan's Ipad.

Math

Genevieve lesson 29 - angles, types of triangles, percents

Nathan Bridge after lesson 15

Vision

Vision therapy, we left the house at 1 and got back home just after 4.  Poor Nathan gets carsick almost every time we drive in.  He is doing well completing his excercises, he wishes he could see results sooner.  When he was unwell this week he was saying this is such a waste of time.  So I did discuss with his therapist that Nathan wants to see results, so at least she is aware and can talk to Nathan about how he is improving etc.  Maybe she will realize that for Nathan seeing improvement will be the biggest motivator he can receive.

After school

When we got home, Genevieve and Nathan went outside to play.  Genevieve decided to run up and down our hill a few times.  Not sure where that is coming from, maybe they are discussing this at cheer, keeping active, in shape, or like most things with Genevieve it could be just her.  Nathan went out and played with his new RC.

We then had dinner and Nathan played with his tablet for a half hour or so, and Genevieve watched a movie on her computer.  Nathan then had to do his chores before bed.  He has become a little obsessed with doing his chores, I will not complain, but I did tell him that we need to start getting ready for bed earlier then, because it was 8:45 before he got into bed.

Friday January 22, Full day of homeschooling

Parenting

Well I woke up feeling achy all over and not feeling that well, so I slept in.  I let Genevieve sleep in too I figured she probably needed it as she is not quite recovered, she slept until 10:30, longest I have ever seen her sleep.  So I was pretty moody today, every  little thing seemed to bother me (remind you of anyone).  So I think I was pretty hard on both Nathan and Genevieve.  They did handle it pretty well all things considered.  We did accomplish quite a bit considering our late start.  Both Nathan and Genevieve will have to complete some work tomorrow as we did not finish today.  But as I write this I now know for sure why I had a crappy parenting day today, I now have the flu and I am getting sick uggg, and no one to take care of me, they are all sleeping...  Hopefully I dont get as sick as Genevieve, I dont need to be throwing up all night...

Math

Both completed the next lesson in Math

Science

We read chapter 3 in our book on the periodic table.  We looked at atoms, and electron orbitals.  We will have to finish a couple more exercises in this chapter to solidify what we have learned.  

Language Arts - My side of the Mountain

Genevieve 

she spent about two hours today working on their final project, making credit signs and all of the signs they will use in their stop motion on Monday

She also spent time working on her newspaper article.  She wanted to print out some pictures to put on it, but our printer is acting wonky.  I wanted her to just add the pictures directly into her google doc, but she didnt want to.  She wants to have it printed out to show people, she wants to show her teacher this way.  I showed her how I had put Nathan's on the blog but she did not want that, oh frustrating strongwilled child of mine.  She ended up printing pictures that she could colour herself.  So I have no idea when she will have time to finish this project.  

Nathan

here is Nathans newspaper article for my side of the mountain.  I think he did a fairly good job completing this.  He was able to edit it by himself and go back and add details.  I did try to convince him to add some more details about his friends.  I also helped Nathan in the picture as he did not know how to wrap the text.  We had to google it to figure out how to do this in word.  I had a conversation with Nathan about effort today, not sure today was the best day since  I was so grumpy, but I felt like he knew he could add details to make this story better but he choose not too.  But when I think about where Nathan's writing has been and how much better this is, I dont think I should complain.  I feel like I can hear Nathan's voice in this piece.  Overall we are soooo headed in the right direction, I know he has the ability to do some great writing in there, and I think we will all be surprised soon.  I think I just need a way to encourage his efforts and how far he has come without putting too much pressure on him.

Did I just say yes to 3 cheer teams???

Cheer

Well today I somehow managed to say yes to Genevieve joining another cheer team.  I went to pick her up today and she comes out to get me, mom, mom can I stay an extra hour, they want to know if I can stay.  So I went in wondering ok what is this about, thinking maybe they just wanted her to do some extra tumbling work for Youth 2 as she has just been added doing a back handspring at the front and I was sure she needed to perfect it.  It turns out they wanted her to join a junior team, as they needed some more tumblers on the team.  Good news is that this team will only add an extra 1 hour on thursdays as practices are at the same time, she just wont get a break.

School work

wow both Genevieve and Nathan put in such great efforts and had great results as well.

Math

both completed a lesson

Nathan - lesson 17  nathan did great today, you can really see the difference when he is not suffering or recovering from a migraine

Genevieve Lesson 29 - more percents and fractions

Moving Beyond the Page My side of the Mountain

both are working on their articles, Genevieve is a little more polished and closer to finishing.  Genevieve looked up a lot of information for her article, I didnt even know what some of these terms were.  She wanted to make sure she was using big words.

 Nathan put in a great effort today and I was impressed by his writing.   He has not embraced writing to many times so I was glad to see that when I said he had to proof read before I came and gave it a read, he had done a great job doing this.

Canadian Studies

We read some more of vikings and had some great discussions

Extracurricular 

So since the kids worked so efficiently today we decided to go to homeschool gymnastics for a while. They hurried and finished their paper route in a record 30 minutes.  So we then went off to gymnastics and then to cheer

Homeschool Hockey

Wednesdays during this new year will be our least productive for sit down school work, but we managed to get some in today.  

I have been having a harder time sleeping this past week (I think after 5 weeks of Jeff snoring, I miss it), and with that means it's much harder for me to get out of bed. 

Wednesday mornings start early as I have to have the garbage out at 7 am, because they usually arrive at 7:01, I can only imagine what the garbage truck drivers think of me running out half dressed in the morning.  My heart is racing as I have just ran down two flights of stairs, and have dragged my garbage can to the curb.  I hear the truck about 5 houses away, so that gives you an idea of what I must look like as I bolt out of bed. I managed to accomplish the task this morning, and as I was ascending the stairs again I was dreaming of 1/2 hour of more sleep, I was met by Genevieve wide awake and ready to go, I convinced her I needed 1/2 an hour.  I was then awoken by Nathan coming in my room doing laundry...ugh I guess it's time to get out of bed.  Genevieve had started breakfast.

Lief Ericson

While eating breakfast we read about Eric the lucky, and some other interesting things about the Vikings.  We learned about how they navigated and discussed lines of latitude, I love this part of homeschooling, I can really gauge if they understand what we are discussing, and then go off in small tangents. I love having globes, maps and resources readily available to make it a conversation  and valuable learning.

Math

Next they both completed a lesson in math.  Nathan was working on lowest common denominators.  Lesson 16

Here is Genevieve's worksheet.  She completed two very similar. Lesson 28  

8-12 she answered incorrectly as she answered in fractions and not in percents, we orally went over corrections

Physiotherapy 

Nathan continues to get stronger and improve, but it really is amazing how many more things we need to work on to help him.  I know our physiotherapist is always astounded by how quickly he is progressing. 

Music therapy 

Music they both had great sessions with Kim.  I heard a lot of music theory being discussed, and practiced.  

Hockey

Hockey, I am thinking we might try moving nathan up to the next level in hockey, the time slot does not work as well, but I think between grandparents and Jeff being home we may be able to manage it.  There is only six weeks left.  

CSOPA

Genevieve is really starting to enjoy csopa.  Today she was not as happy as she was supposed to receive her script and she did not.  Hopefully she will receive it next week and she can start working on it.

Health

Genevieve has a cold, I think part of the flu from last week.   Bonus I thinks she passed it on to me, heres hoping I can power on through it, so far I only have a headache and I am feeling tired.

Nathan while better today was not completely recovered.  He was pale and very tired.  He had a more difficult time with schoolwork today and complained that the skip counting cd on the way to physio was giving him a headache. 

Homeschooling with a chronic illness

The Morning

We didnt start out on a very good note.  I finally managed to drag Nathan and Genevieve out of bed at 8:45 for breakfast.  Nathan was grumpy, even when I tried to snuggle him in bed.  We came down to the table and had some scrambled eggs and fruit.  Nathan remained grumpy at the table, every noise Genevieve made was bothering him, he didn't like this or that, everything bothered him.  this should have been my first clue something was off.... but we have a schedule to keep, so off to his bedroom he went and he was asked to try and come back in a better mood.  He arrived back, trying very hard to be in a better mood, but barely succeeding.

We started at the table with me reading about Mendeleev and the Periodic table of elements.  I think that we started with Chemistry is the only reason Nathan was able to last as long as he did.  We moved to the living room for a change of scenery.  Once I finished reading, I got out the connecting tiles.

ETA connecting tiles

                                                                         ETA tiles

Loved this set, kids had a good time putting it together, today they just put the periodic table together by looking at a table.  A bonus it was good OT for Nathan, it was difficult to do and his hands hurt after.  So as much fun as this was, I still had a grumpy child and I was getting grumpy to work doing a group project, it did get done, but man it was a little difficult.  I was going to have them doing their other chemistry assignments together but forget that, they can do them by themselves.  

This picture would have been better if I had taken it of them actually completing it.  Trust me I did not have time to take the picture, to many shes touching me's to break-up

The first worksheet was one where you had to find the symbols for elements and put the symbols in to find out a silly riddle.  Genevieve liked doing this, and it was fun for her to look and she was mom is bromine a gas, so she could figure out where to look on the table.  

Yes this would be better if I took a picture of the sheet that was actually completed,
this is nathans sheet, not done.  umm I have no idea where gigi's landed up,
and after today I did not want to search.
Trust me, it got done :)

The second worksheet you had cards kind of like trading cards and questions and you had to find out say what element is used in toothpaste, or televisions...  Nathan was doing this one, and then he started laying on the floor and grabbing his head.

Nathan's activity 2 sheet

I should have known

I should have known Nathan was having a problem.  I had put on the essential oil diffuser.  But when Nathan was having trouble concentrating, he said he felt claustrophobic, I suggested he go outside and play for 15 minutes to try and see if he could refresh himself.  Stupid me how did I forget that claustrophobia is a sign of impending doom.  So when Nathan was on the floor, I said "Nathan do you have a headache?"  He answered that well his head was feeling weird but no headache, I said Nathan buddy you need to notice the signs and realize you need to do something, he responded well I did tell you I was feeling claustrophobic.... oh yeah you did.  So off to bed Nathan went, in the dark, eyepatch on.  There he lay for 3 hours.  He had some pretty good Aura and a headache.

Nathan stayed home with our house cleaner while I ran Genevieve to piano, she stayed the whole 2 hours, so Nathan could stay home and rest.  I returned home to be with Nathan and about 1:30, he got out of bed feeling quite a bit better, he was no longer sensitive to light and just had a headache, and felt queezy.  I called my parents to see if they could come down and stay with Nathan for the day as Genevieve had a crazy day and I didn't want to drag Nathan out after the day he had

Genevieve's (and mine) crazy day

So Genevieve did not get a lot of book work done today!  Off schedule already, I think I jinxed it saying that we would have more time this week.  So we worked on Chemistry, then she worked on her newspaper story a little, but then I had to make lunch and it was time to go to Piano.  Dealing with a grumpy child all morning you end up not getting as much done!

But gigis day was crazy busy with all of the extras.  

- She had Piano and voice from 1-3 (no math as we usually do it while Nathan is in piano)

- An extra CSOPA practice from 3:30-5 (I took her out 15 minutes early)

- cheer practice 5-7:30

I made dinner while she was at CSOPA and she was able to eat on the 20 minute drive, I am tired just driving her around!

Cheer- I stayed (because I was so tired) and watched from my car gigi's cheer practice, they changed up the routine and improved it for their next competition in Bellevue on the 29th.  Genevieve has improved in such a short period of time that they put her right at the front to do a power roundoff/backhandspring.  Her handspring is looking great, it would have been better today, if I had not forgotten her shoes, I told her I would bring them, I did not, dance slippers do not work as well.

I am thankful my mom came down to watch Nathan, not only was it better for Nathan, I had 1/2 hour to sit down and finally drink a cup of tea, that I needed to power me through the day.  And wasn't I just saying that I felt well rested???

Lets hope tomorrow brings a migraine free day!

January 18 - stop motion

Monday morning- first day of our new schedule 

Nathan set two alarm clocks for himself and was on my room at 7:30 bright and cheery trying to get me out of bed.  Out of bed both Gigi and I got at 8 am.  Oatmeal was on the table at 8:30 and I started reading our book.  We finished My Side of the Mountain today.  Unfortunately it took us until 10 am to finish reading, I was planning on doing math from 9-9:45.  Can't believe how long it takes to read.  So it turns out, I wasn't supposed to finish reading today!!!  Ha ha oops, at least that frees up more time later this week!

Jessica and stop motion

Jessica asked if we can incorporate stop motion into one of our assignments for school.  I thought she was thinking would it be interesting to learn I said yes.  But she thought I meant yes I have a project in mind.  Anyway we were able to look and decide that instead of the final project they would complete a stop motion video about the food chain from our book.  Perfect tie in.  I love how Jessica can do this.  So today they made all their animals and scenery and next Monday they will film.  This is excellent as this means we can spend Tuesday and Thursday working on our newspaper articles, I know they will need the time.  This means we should have some spare time on Friday that we can use for Canadian studies. 

this is a poster size board that Nathan and Genevieve painted for their backdrop.  You can see they also made trees and 3d affects

forest animals from clay

Math

After Jessica left, we ran late, the kids worked on math and are at the same time.  They both had a couple of questions left which I told them they would have to complete before they have their play date with Tyler and Cody.  Our plan was to watch the Latin DVD on the drive but our remote does not work and it would only play the first episode. 

this worksheet had her looking at stock prices and looking at change in price, it was a little tricky because if it was a + change it meant that yesterdays price was actually less, so you had to do the opposite of what you thought

relating percent to fractions

thinking about percents and fractions

I was surprised at how easy Genevieve found this one.  I asked her to leave question 12 as we had to go and it would take too long

word problems she completed all the word problems today Monday the 18th 

Should I be worried that she was able to figure out sale prices so easily, do you think she will be a shopper?

And yes she does do most calculations in her head.  She may scribble a little but she always adds the numbers in her head.

Vision therapy.  Therapy was good, he was given more exercises and some harder ones.

Play date and dinner with Tyler and Cody, we stopped by on the way home, and Nathan had brought his new RC with him so they all went out and played on the track Tyler and Cody have.  I am very grateful to have these friends in our lives.  Such kind and wonderful kids they all are together, and the parents are pretty awesome too :)

History of Canada timelines

I am excited to start these timelines, and hope that they are something they can look back on over the years.  Genevieve absolutely loves doing timelines, and the hands on learning like this.  Nathan it is hard to tell if he likes it, he seems to as he is doing it.

Nathan right, Genevieve left

Genevieve's she has to add a paragraph on the bering land bridge.  She wanted to add details and did not have time, she doesnt mind doing this kind of stuff in her spare time on Sundays

Nathan's 

Hello 2016 New Year, new plans...

I'm sorry...

Within days of each other, I received a couple of very polite emails from Nathan and Genevieve's teachers, they both wanted to know how everything is going.  No we did not fall off the face of the earth, but we did take a very long extended Christmas break.  Jeff arrived home December 8th, and we took off the entire 5 weeks he was home.  I am sorry Rebecca, and Rachel, I know I wasn't very communicative even in November!  I was trying to hurry and get our work done before Jeff arrived home.  This plan also failed and we still have a few days left to finish our novel My Side of the Mountain.

I just realized that two of my posts were only drafts and were not posted as well!  you must have really thought I had given up :)

5 week Christmas Break!

My plan for Jeff being home was that the first few weeks before Christmas we were going to spend everyday making homemade Christmas presents.   What I failed to remember is that the last few weeks before Christmas we have things all the time! Recitals, concerts, performances coming at us from everywhere!  So homemade Christmas was a good idea, here I thought oh how fun, we wont be doing actual school work, but we will be doing woodworking and baking, and lots of crafting.  We did some wood working, I found a neat book at the library on making toys, the kids each made a penny shooter, but we didn't finish them, they have to be assembled and painted.  We still did manage to make some homemade gifts and both Nathan and Genevieve were really happy to be able to give those away.

Even though we were busy this Christmas break it felt like a long time Jeff was home (in a good way Jeff, although it is nice to be back to normal too!).  I felt like I had 5 weeks to recover, and feel pretty refreshed.  Although we didn't do any formal schooling, our lives are always filled with watching documentaries, going to see the Alberta ballet perform the nutcracker at the Queen Elizabeth theatre, going to Canuck's games, sledding and frolicking in the snow, and of course Drs appointments.

Suzy Snowflake costume for Voice recital

Back

He's still so cute

Reimer family dinner

christmas morning

Christmas diner with the Bourquin's very relaxed day

canucks skills competition

awww

We so handsome!  Post Nutcraker, all of us agreed that the previous time we have seen the alberta balet nutcraker was superior.  We still enjoyed the performance.

Optomitrist - 6 years of struggles answered with an eye exam

We had an interesting appointment with Dr. Johal at Panorama optometry.  Nathan has very mildy complained about difficulties with reading since he started reading.  He has mentioned these problems mildly to both the pediatric opthalmologist, and his optomitrist, that he sees yearly for checkups.  I remember that he told the opthalmologist that it feels like his eyes go cross-eyed sometimes, or that his eyes feel like they are moving themselves.  He has complained that he feels nauseous when he reads, this was improved when he began taking his betablockers, but did not completely disappear.  Nathan had a complete assessment at the office and Jeff and I were both asked to come back in to go over the results.  Dr Johal spent at least 1 hour going over all of Nathans results.  I was shocked when we looked at his results.  Honestly I have no idea how he has been reading!  We got to watch a video that showed where his eyes were when he was reading, he was jumping up down and back and forth all over the page.  You could see how many times he lost his place and had to go back.  He skipped words often.  His tracking was terrible.  Next she talked about divergence and convergence.  He has problems with both.  The convergence will affect his reading more, but his divergence is what makes it impossible for him to see 1 image when he looks through a microscope or binoculars. As a side note I have this difficulty as well, and I have asked many optomitrists why this is and no one was able to give me an answer, and here it seemed pretty basic!  A few other things, when Nathan is reading close up, he sees double, he says that it isnt a big deal because he has always been able to figure out what image is the real one!  When nathan is reading he also sees in 3D, so the words actually lift off the page, he also says its not a big deal, it is only the words at the sides of the page, if he is looking at the words straight ahead they stay on the page.  All of these issues point to weak muscles of the eye, the Dr said that the eye is full of connective tissue, and because Nathans connective tissue is faulty, he is having issues.  Another thing I was not expecting to hear was that Nathan tested 2% in visual memory.  The Dr said this could be a cognitive deficiency, or it could be because Nathan has not had the proper visual imput in order to form a visual memory.  She asked Jeff and I if Nathan was having difficulties with basic math fact
 memorization, and then asked if he excelled at advanced mathmatics.  I think we both started laughing and said yes big time yes, but how do you know that?  She explained to us that basic math facts require a visual memory when you are asked what is 5+3, you see in your head 5+3=8 a visual memory.  Nathan does not have this!  This is why Nathan has been loving word problems all this time, the word problems help him form a picture.  Why oh why did I not switch to life of fred sooner!!!  all word problems.

So here is the game plan with vision.  She said she would like to increase all of Nathan's scores to catch up to the rest of him.  He scored in the 90's in every other test, so she would like to get Nathans scores up to the 90th percentile, not just 50th.  She figures this will require weekly appts for at least 9 months.  We also have to do home therapy 5 days a week.   But she was adamant that she will fix nathan.  Her confidence scared my slightly, as well I have been trained to doubt someone who gives a 100% guarantee!

How vision is going so far...  We had our first appt last week.  Nathan came out of the appointment happy.  He liked his therapist, at first she talked down to him he reports, but then she started talking normaly.  I had a few minutes alone with her and she said she changed how she was talking to him, when he started explaining to her what was going on with his vision, when he was able to tell her he was seeing in 3D and he used the word divergent.  She figured it out on her own that it was better to explain to him, exactly what the exercises were accomplishing.  Nathan is doing wonderful so far on the home therapy, he is asking me to do it everyday, even though it hurts his eyes and makes him queasy.  I am so glad I do not have to fight him on this, and hopefully he will start seeing some changes and that will help him continue on.  I have put it in our schedule as pirate training as Nathan wears a patch for some of his exercises, he thought that was quite funny.

So the good
-Yeah hopefully this will help nathan in so many ways!

The bad
- its in Surrey a 1 hour drive each way every monday
- another activity to get done in our already very hectic schedule

Scheduling

So with this New Year I really had to look at our schedule and figure out how we were going to do it all.  And it became clear there was no way we could.  So we have decided to make a few changes.  We have decided to no longer have an EA on Fridays, we need this funding $ to pay for vision therapy.  We have also decided to stop Thursday classes.  Our schedule did not have enough time at home.  I have been working the last week on setting some goals for the rest of the year, and a schedule.  I find I struggle in this area.  There are certain things that I want to teach, and we just do not have the time.  I wonder how a teacher in a classroom full of kids can possibly accomplish all of their goals for the year.  I do know that what we are doing at home, is more than what they would end up getting at their local brick and mortar school, but I still would like to accomplish more.  I know the amount of days Nathan would be missing because of his migraines, bad days.  And I know that on his bad days we still do some schoolwork which is more then what he would be getting if he was in school, but man on those days, I do find it frustrating that we can not get accomplished what we had planned.  I guess I need to learn to be more flexible.  This can be my goal for this year I guess, not to be so rigid, and learn to go with the flow.  I find that I can do this in the moment, but then after the day is done, I am left going but we didnt get his or that done!  ahh what am I going to do, now we are behind...  So the schedule does have some wiggle room, but probably not as much as we need. Maybe by the time next year comes along I will be able to leave more wiggle room, but there will be so many more books I will want to read... and so much more science to learn...

Ok seriously frustrating, google docs sucks... 3 hours later and I finally have a pdf up of our rest of our year schedule.  They keep changing how you share, and it really was 20 steps before hand anyway.  But now I seriously had to make my own embed code.  I really had to learn some code to get it on this page...  Now I can say I know how to code...

Here is our schedule for what is left of the year




This will be our new weekly schedule.  I seriously can not figure out how teachers fit everything in!

So how did the first week go?

Pretty great, sure there were some struggles getting back into it, but I think we were all ready to get back to routine.  It was a very short first week.  We started on Tuesday with only 1 hour of school work, we had to take jeff to the airport.  Wednesday another short day, we have physio/hockey and CSOPA.  Thursday, was a full day, and we managed to get a lot accomplished.  We started working on our Canada Timeline books, we decided to make one that is the same as our History of the World timelines.  Genevieve loves loves loves doing these timelines.  We completed a lesson in My side of the Mountain, and we completed Math, and Latin.  I talked with both Nathan and Genevieve on the importance that we complete at least 1 lesson of math every day for the rest of the year, we are not allowed to skip any days.  I would like Nathan to finish the algebra with physics book and I would like gigi to complete her text this year, if we do a lesson a day, we should have 5 sick days :)   I did have to speak to Nathan a few times about his effort.  He was wanting to do it just for the sake of completing the assignment instead of doing a good job.  Genevieve was also giving me a little attitude on Friday, turned out she was really sick oops...

Painting on the Canadian flag for our tittle pages

November 24th week

fun times with Daddy

This past week with Jeff home was busy. We had a regular school week, and then a busy weekend.  Friday we had a friends children stay the night.   A normal Friday would have been busy, but Gigi had an extra cheer practice 2 hours, our pediatrician also wanted to see us, and nathan had soccer.  I cancelled our EA for the day because I wasn't sure what time our pediatrician was going to be able to see us, it ended up not happening as he had a patient that needed all if his attention.   Kids woke up early and has some play time before Gigi had cheer at 9:30.  Nathan ended up with soccer at 2:30.

After Nathan's soccer game we headed to Vancouver to stay the night at the Marriott, we had tickets on Sunday to watch cirque du solei.  It was to celebrate Jeff's birthday.  When we arrived in Vancouver we went out to eat and had a good dinner at the cactus club, we walked a little around vancouver but it was pretty late.  Next day we woke up and had breakfast at the Marriott, it was so good and cheap!  kids buffet was I think 5.95, and they made fresh gluten free things for Genevieve!  We then went swimming at the pool, got ready for the day, and wandered around vancouver.  We drove over to granville island and shopped.  And finally it was time for Cirque.  We loved it!  The kids and I agreed that we liked the other cirque performance we had gone to but, it was still pretty fantastic.

Daddys always more fun then mommy

here are some Random pictures from the rest of the Year!  No wonder my teachers were wondering what was up...  it looks like a few of my posts were drafts and did not get posted oops...

Christmas card picture for paper delivery.  They made homemade cards to deliver to all 130 houses

Decorating the Christmas tree at Grandma and Grandpa's

Its my birthday!

Genevieve doing math work at the cultural centre

this is where we sit and do our Math work, it is so nice and we are usually alone, a nice little break

last week of October

Well Last week of October was a busy busy week.

Sunday - kids had a birthday party and then I ran them up to my parents house to stay the night

Monday - I took my father in law into royal columbian hospital for angioplasty, surgery was a bigger success then what we anticipated!  But we needed to be at the hospital for 6 am!!!!  so that meant waking up at 3:30, now this is not a normal time that any sane person should be waking up at.  So all was great with my father in law, until we met with that nurse, you know the nurse, there is always one of them.  Well this one scared the pants off of my mother in law by telling her tales of his femoral artery starting to spurt blood everywhere and the fact it was an artery and it would just keep on pumping until he didnt have anymore blood left in his body to spurt out.  And the nurse told my MIL that she needed to put pressure on the wound and call 911.  Now my MIL is a very nervous person to begin with, and I thought her eyeballs were about to pop out of he head, as she was asking well how am I supposed to stop the bleeding and call 911 I am home alone!  Well guess who slept on the couch Monday night.  Thanks dad for keeping the kids an extra night.

So Tuesday I woke up, picked up a coffee at starbucks, and drove the hour to Hope to go get my kidlets.  I picked up the kids, headed back to our house for a change of clothing and then we met tyler and cody for a playday at the chilliwack Corn Maze.  We had such a great day roasting hotdogs and marshmellows, getting lost in the cornmaze, and simmone and I just hanging out as the kids explored.  Now Genevieve had mentioned on and off all day that her tummy was a little sore, but after I picked her up from cheer it was really not too good.  So I tucked all the kids in bed, and Genevieve wakes up throwing up.  Did I mention, I was in the bathtub, relaxing after two days of lack of sleep???  And my poor daughter who always makes it to the bathroom when sick, had thrown up all over the carpet.  Did I mention jeff was due to come home in 2 hours, could she not have waited 2 hours...  So I spent the next 2 hours, not in my bathtub, and cuddled in a bed, but cleaning vomit off the floor.  So day 3 of not such a good night sleep with a sick kid.

Wednesday - Genevieve woke up refreshed as if she had never been sick, me day three lack of sleep, hmm I bet I was grumpy.  Was I grumpy Jeff?  So since everyone seemed fine, we though well maybe it was gluten that did it to genevieve, so we continued on with our day and all the plans, we went to physio and music therapy, and then we went to Nathans long awaited Pediatrician appointment.

Nathan pediatrician appt

- Dr believes Nathans seizure was because of severe bradycardia, or asystole.  While this does sound terrifying when you write it down like this, it actually isn't that bad of a thing to happen.  He believes it has to do with his autonomic dysfunction and that it was neurally mediated, basically a fainting spell that caused his heart to slow or stop briefly.  Thankfully his heart can restart after.  His pediatrician does not feel that this will be an ongoing dilemma for Nathan, we had a little laugh and said well like most things with Nathan, hopefully this will only happen one time.  So we will hope that this is the last we will see of Nathans heart stopping anytime soon.

-Nathan told the pediatrician he didn't like homeschooling because he didn't have any friends.  When he said this I was like what are you talking about, he sometimes talks like this, but not very often.  So of course his pediatrician asked if he could talk to Nathan by himself.   All the while I am thinking really Nathan what are you telling him.  One question he asked was what Nathan wanted the pediatrician to do for him regarding his migraines, Nathan answered, I don't know I haven't gone to school to become a pediatrician, your supposed to tell me what you can do.  Of course he laughed.  Nathan did make sure to tell his pediatrician he liked learning at home better than at school.

- So we left with the Dr to review some things and he wants to see us in 2 weeks.  He wants to look into a new medication for Nathan, and he also would like to see Nathan try meditation and Biofeedback to help control his autonomic dysfunction.  But he wants to look into finding someone who we can trust to do biofeedback who is not a quack. (okay those were not his words).

He also said not to worry about Nathan's eye movements.


So that night Nathan starts throwing up, so I have another sleepless night with Nathan in my bed.  Jeff went and slept with gigi.  Jeff came running into the room about 4 am because he heard nathan getting sick, he was rushing into help Nathan.  Nathan was yelling go away go away ( he had been trying to get sick for the last hour)  Poor guy had nothing left.  And jeff had slept through the whole night of Nathan getting sick, but he thought he was rushing in to save the day lol  Oh men, how I would love to be able to sleep so soundly.

Thursday - we missed thrusday class, but we did end up doing some school work.  We worked on our energy unit.  We also had a math lesson for each of the kids.  The kids and jeff had a great time with our energy unit today and played with snap circuits and learning about solar energy.

Friday - (I woke up after a full nightsleep! after 4 nights of very little sleep)  Fish hatchery - I have no idea what they did, they must have done some awesome things as Rebecca organized the field trip.  But she took some great pictures so here they are

Nathan rested and took off soccer practice and I took Genevieve to twisters for an extra tumble practice.

Saturday - halloween, here are some pictures of halloween....

scarry Nathan

cheer bunny

I'm so cute!

Katy Perry